Author: lt_admin

There are many qualified structural engineers in the Bay Area, but how do you determine which
engineer or engineering firm is well suited for your large-scale project?
You should begin by clearly defining your project goals and scope of work, and then find an engineer who can help you achieve your vision. Here are some recommendations about what kind of service you should look for from a Bay Area structural engineer.
Read more

This December has been the wettest month for San Jose in 60 years. What does that mean for you as a Bay Area property owner who is looking to start your construction project, especially during the rainy season? Any active construction site that typically disturbs more than 1 acre of land is legally required to have a SWPPP, or stormwater pollution prevention plan. A property owner is held responsible for violations to stormwater pollution requirements and can be subject to substantial fees and penalties.
Read more

After the magnitude 6.0 South Napa earthquake at 3 am on August 24th, two large historical buildings in downtown Napa were red-tagged and deemed unsafe because of falling debris onto the sidewalk. The falling bricks posed a life-safety risk, and we can only imagine the potential danger to pedestrians if the quake had occurred at 3 pm instead of 3 am. It is important to note that these two older buildings (“unreinforced masonry” buildings, or URM buildings) had previously been seismically retrofitted.
Read more

Secretly, you may want to add a few years to the projected completion date of a complex construction project, to account for potential delays. But this was not the case for the construction of the new 275,000-square-foot Thermo Fisher Scientific manufacturing facility in the Warm Springs Area of South Fremont. A little over two years after project design began, a sustainable and large-scale research and development (R&D) building now stands just south of Tesla Motors. We at Landtech Consultants (the Thermo Fisher project civil and structural engineer) are breathing sighs of relief.
Read more

You can fulfill your vision for a successful development project in the Bay Area through effective planning, and to begin, the civil engineer can help you determine the scope of the infrastructure that will serve the project. The infrastructure involves issues related to access, utilities, and drainage, as well as site and environmental constraints. While each project is unique and requires its own creative approach, the following are usually considered. Read more

The planning process, as with many situations in life, can be the most important, and for the building process, one part of the initial development stage is the creation of an accurate site plan to guide the project.

A site plan shows the full relationship of the building to the land, and is a graphical representation that includes special requirements such as site access and circulation, parking, walkways, and landscape/hardscape areas. Typically, the initial concept site plan is drawn by an architect, and the engineer’s role is to help develop it further.

What is "resilience"?

The Foundation defines “building resilience” to be “...about making people, communities and systems better prepared to withstand catastrophic events--both natural and man-made” and be able to “...emerge stronger from these shocks and stressors.” The selected cities presented a dedicated commitment to prepare for, withstand, and bounce back from potential challenges they might face in the coming years.
Read more

The Bay Area has two up-and-coming building projects that will be quite the spectacle once they are finished. The first--Apple's new headquarters--promises to be the next home for the company for decades to come. The second, a planned massive redevelopment of East Oakland, Calif. called Coliseum City, claims to be the largest transit-oriented development project in California.Read more

Let us face it...people are moving away (literally) from the idea of suburbs. Many Americans, especially young people, want to live where they can easily get to work, and have access to local hotspots and businesses. Therefore the idea of transit-oriented development (TOD) is very appealing because development near a transit station offers a mix of housing, employment, retail, and transportation choices.Read more